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+ George Cooper 5
ADAPT (240)
The Cincinnati Enquirer Photo by the Cincinnati Enquirer/Michael E. Keating: Four police officers holding a thin, tall man (Jim Parker)by his legs and arms suspending him in the air while they try to place him in the wheelchair. Another police officer and a passerby at the street corner are visible in background, as well as a city bus parked with its doors open. Caption: Cincinnati Police lower ADAPT activist Jim Parker into his wheelchair after removing him from a Metro bus. He had crawled aboard. [Headline] Group seeks access for wheelchairs By David Wells George Cooper and Bob Kafka climbed aboard a City Metro bus at Government Square Monday, paid their fares and were arrested. Cooper and Kafka were among several dozen members of the American Disabled for Accessible Public Transit (ADAPT) demonstrating this week against Metro and the American Public Transit Association gathered at the Westin Hotel. ADAPT disrupted operations at Metro’s main downtown stop on Government Square for about two hours Monday. Following arrests of Cooper and Kafka, Metro rerouted its buses and avoided further confrontation with the wheelchair-bound demonstrators. ADAPT wants full accessibility for the handicapped on all public transportation facilities. Regular Metro coaches do not have wheelchair lifts. The company does provide transportation for the handicapped with special, lift-equipped Access vans. ADAPT claims that Access vans are unreliable in poor weather and even in good weather require a 24-hour advance reservation. The group also wants the national transit association to adopt a resolution at its Cincinnati convention requiring full access for the handicapped. Wheelchair-confined demonstrators picketed Westin entrances throughout the day but were denied admission to the hotel or adjoining public atrium. Cooper of Dallas, and Kafka of Austin, Texas, were charged with criminal trespass after they refused requests from Metro and the Cincinnati Police to get off the bus. “There are no lifts in these buses. It is not safe (for the handicapped), “said Murray Bond, assistant general manager for the company. Yet, after Cooper and Kafka were arrested, they were transported to the Hamilton County Justice Center on the bus rather than being transferred to a lift van. “That was a judgement call on my part,” said Capt. Dale Menkhaus, who headed the police detail. “It was decided it would be much easier and safer to transport them on the bus than to try to carry them off of it.” Four officers rode with the prisoners to ensure they were not jostled on the five-block trip to jail. Also arrested at the demonstration was Mike Auberger from Denver, who Menkhaus said attempted to block the bus carrying Cooper and Kafka. Auberger was charged with disorderly conduct and taken to the Justice Center in a lift van. Menkhaus said it was “a no win situation” for the police. No matter how sensitively the officers acted, they still had to confront and arrest people in wheelchairs. Officers in that detail were briefed on handling the demonstrators. Menkhaus said. “Our officers were told to ask each individual what the best way to lift him was, even to the point of which limb they would prefer to have moved first.” Still, to the members ADAPT, they were being dragged off the buses. “People were being dragged off the buses because they just wanted to ride,” said Bill Bolte of Los Angeles. When ADAPT member Rick James, a cerebral palsy victim repeatedly tried to roll his motorized chair into the street and in front of buses, police officers unplugged the chair’s battery. It left James immobile on the sidewalk. Other ADAPT members reconnected the battery and James pulled up in front of another bus. Metro eventually took the bus out of service and left it parked at the stop during the demonstration. At the Justice Center, all three prisoners co-operated fully with deputies, said Sheriff Lincoln Stokes. About five other demonstrators boarded buses that pulled in the stops at Government Square but they got off the bus when asked to do so, Menkhaus said.
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JULY 1986 Disclosure Disabled Cripple Cincinnati PHOTO: A march of people in wheelchairs across a metal bridge that looks like a giant erector set. Three across lead the march, and behind you can see others in an almost single file line. On right, Mike Auberger with his braids and headband rides an electric chair, and has a poster across his legs "Give me a lift, not the SHAFT." In the center, Stephanie Thomas with a bush of hair and a sign that reads "Access is a Civil Right", pushes her manual in a wheelie. On the left, Cincinnatian Gary Nelson, rides his manual as Babs Johnson pushes him. She is looking to her right talking with someone in line. Behind and between Mike and Stephanie, Rick James is visible, riding laid back in his powerchair. Others are behind in line, but the focus is not deep enough to make them out. Caption reads: GARY NELSON, STEPHANIE THOMAS and MIKE AUBERGER lead an ADAPT parade into Cincinnati. During four days of demonstrations there, 17 wheelchair riding protestors were arrested and taken to jail. Fifty disabled Americans went to Cincinnati at the end of May to protest discrimination against people in wheelchairs—and they put together some protests that city authorities will never forget. The wheelchair-riding demonstrators, who came from as far away as Texas and Colorado, are members of ADAPT— American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation. They're tired of being denied access to public buses, and they went to Cincinnati to confront a meeting of the American Public Transit Association (APTA). APTA represents public transit officials from cities all over the country, and 600 of them were in Cincinnati in May for a regional education and training conference. In the space of four days, ADAPT staged half a dozen dramatic demonstrations, tied up bus service for an entire afternoon, shut down the office of the local transit system, caused havoc at a major downtown hotel, and had 17 of their members arrested, including 3 who were temporarily banned from the city of Cincinnati. “I've been kicked out of a lot of places," says ADAPT organizer Mike Auberger, "but never from a whole city!" ADAPT was formed in Denver in 1983, after Auberger — who is a quadriplegic as a result of a bobsled accident — and other handicapped activists convinced city officials there to put wheelchair lifts on every single bus. “It took six years of street fighting to win in Denver," says ADAPT organizer Wade Blank, a minister who became involved with handicapped issues while working as an orderly in a nursing home. “So then we said, are we going to sit on our laurels, or are we going to expand to other cities?" ADAPT demonstrators have hit APTA events in Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio. The demonstrations have a double purpose: to pressure APTA to go on record in favor of accessible public transit nationwide, and to push local officials to change their bus systems. While APTA remains stubborn, ADAPT can point to a number of local successes in cities such as Los Angeles, Seattle, and Kansas City. ADAPT members see their cause as a civil rights struggle, and their actions call attention to the injustice suffered by disabled people who are denied access to basic public services. The first arrests in Cincinnati came on Monday, May l9, when George Cooper and Bob Kaska climbed out of their wheelchairs and crawled aboard a Cincinnati city bus. They paid their fares, but were arrested for “trespassing.” Mike Auberger, who blocked the front of the bus, was also arrested, and the three were banned from the city by a municipal judge. Monday night, APTA conference-goers had a reception scheduled at the College Football Hall of Fame, outside the city limits. ADAPT protestors went out to meet them, but found entrances to the building locked by local sheriffs. They were waiting on the shoulder of the four lane road leading to the Hall of Fame when four buses carrying hundreds of APTA members came down the road, rolling along at about 40 miles an hour. Suddenly, a group of people in wheelchairs bolted out to block the buses. “l remember flashing in my mind that these might be the first deaths of the civil rights movement of the handicapped," recalls Wade Blank. No one was injured: two buses steered onto the shoulder of the road, and two others came to a halt. The conventioneers had to get off the buses and walk the rest of the way to the Hall of Fame. On Tuesday, ADAPT settled for a symbolic action, raising a cross in front of the Westin Hotel, where APTA was holding its meeting. The cross, they said, demonstrated APTA's “crucification" of disabled people. On Wednesday, it was back into battle. The banning order against Kaska, Cooper and Auberger had been lifted, but they got arrested again by chaining their wheelchairs to the front doors of the Cincinnati bus system’s main offices. Fourteen other disabled people, meanwhile, were arrested for blocking entrances at the Westin Hotel. All seventeen of them wound up in a classroom at the city jail. "It was definitely a new experience for the whole justice system,” says Mike Auberger. “Everyone received a real education in disabilities." Most of the protesters were released after a day or two, but Auberger, Kaska and Cooper, who were viewed as the real troublemakers, had to stay in jail for six days. This caused some serious problems, as none of the men can use the bathroom without the help of an attendant—and no one in the Cincinnati jail system was prepared to deal with that situation. Auberger, who had a skin rash and a urinary infection, was eventually hospitalized. All three protestors have now been released, he reports, and they are back home and suffering no serious long term effects from their ordeal in prison. The difficulties in jail, he thinks, “were more of a left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing type of thing than any serious intent to do harm." Their grueling experience, however, shows just how difficult it is for disabled people to stand up for their rights in a society that is not prepared to deal with people in wheelchairs. Despite such obstacles, ADAPT members are determined to continue their struggle for full civil rights. They are already planning for their next confrontation, which will take place on October 6 through 9 in Detroit, where APTA is scheduled to have its 1986 national convention. Without doubt, it will be a memorable occasion. HIGHLIGHTED TEXT: Suddenly, a group of people in wheelchairs bolted out to block the buses. . . “I remember flashing in my mind, ” said one observer, “that these might be the first deaths of the civil rights movement of the handicapped. ” BOXED TEXT BELOW ARTICLE: BE THERE! People in and our of wheelchairs are welcome to join the ADAPT protest in Detroit, to speak out for fully accessible public transportation. For information, contact Mike Auberger or Wade Blank at ADAPT, 4536 E. Colfax, Denver, Colorado, 80220. 303-393-0630 303-393-0630.
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8B The Cincinnati Post, Tuesday,May 20, 1986 [Two articles in this clip.] PHOTO Patrick Reddy/The Cincinnati Post: A man in a power wheelchair (Rick James) with a leather hat with a wide brim, sits in a semi-reclined position, hand partially hidden by his sleeve, finger on the joystick. On the side of Rick's chair you can see an ADAPT "We Will Ride" sticker. Two police officers are behind him; one is standing holding the push handles on his chair, the other is squatting down and sticking his nightstick through the spokes of Rick's chair. Behind them is the street and bus, and behind that some city buildings. Caption reads: A Cincinnati police officer jams a nightstick into the spokes of a wheelchair to prevent Rick James of Salt Lake City from blocking a Queen City Metro bus Monday at Government Square. Title: Activists block buses’ route By Edwina Blackwell, Post Staff reporter On a stretch or road near the College Football Hall of Fame, strong beliefs over the rights of the handicapped to public transportation confronted the steel frames of buses. lt happened Monday night when 15 disabled activists rolled into the pathway of vehicles traveling 40 mph. Seven buses carrying conferees attending the eastern meeting of the American Public Transit Association in Cincinnati were on their way to the Hall of Fame at Kings Island in Warren County for a reception. As the buses neared the Hall around 6:30 pm about 15 members of American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation moved onto the road, blocking a portion of Kings Island Drive. Police had set up barricades by the hall earlier. However, that didn't keep the ADAPT members from rolling onto the roadway. "I remember flashing in my mind that these might be the first deaths of the civil rights movement of the handicapped," said the Rev. Wade Blank of Denver, Colo., co-founder of ADAPT. No one was injured and no arrests were made. But the members of the Denver-based group say their action shows how far they are willing to go. The protesters want the transit officials to change their national policy on accessibility and Queen City Metro to have wheelchair lifts on all new buses. Today ADAPT members plan to demonstrate in front of the Westin Hotel, where the APTA convention is being held. There were also disabled people riding the buses that were halted Monday night. Dixie Harmon was one of the people who got off the bus Monday in the midst of the ADAPT protest. Ms. Harmon, a quadriplegic in a wheelchair. is co-chairwoman of the Specialized Transportation Advisory Committee, a local committee which works with Queen City Metro in reviewing handicapped needs. But when she met her peers on the protest line, the reaction was less than cordial. Both she and Dan Cleary, president of the Greater Cincinnati Coalition of People with Disabilities, were subjected to name calling for their decision not to demonstrate. Wednesday she will be on a APTA panel discussing transit system services to disabled individuals. "I was very uncomfortable," she said of the Monday night confrontation. "(But) I have to understand that they're angry, too." Queen City Metro and Cincinnati police say they are ready for any more protests during the convention, which ends Thursday. Judith Van Ginkel, director of Metro communications, said bus drivers have been instructed to stop immediately and call police if a protester tries to block the vehicles. Earlier Monday, three ADAPT members — Michael Auberger, Bob Kafka and George Cooper—were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct for attaching themselves to Metro buses downtown. [Second Article] Title: Disabled lament lack of transportation beyond city limits By Edwina Blackwell Post staff reporter For Linda Geraci, ACCESS provides a step toward independence. Every weekday morning, she can expect to see the specially equipped van in front of her apartment, ready to transport her to work. Confined to a wheelchair because of muscular dystrophy, she needs the lift-equipped vehicle to survive on her own. For many, ACCESS inhibits mobility, however, because it does not travel beyond Cincinnati city limits. "lf we want to go in a closed mall, there is none inside city limits. Most of your movie theaters seem to be in those areas also," said Ms. Geraci, a counselor at Total Living Concepts Inc., an organization that promotes independent living among handicapped individuals. Riders who utilize the curb-to-curb service of ACCESS must make reservations at least 24 hours In advance and preferably one week in advance. The 19 specialized transportation vans used for the elderly and the disabled serve only Cincinnati proper in addition to Elmwood Place, St. Bernard and Norwood. Even short trips like running to the grocery store must be scheduled in advance. "You tell them when you want to go and when you want them to come get you and you hope that your ice cream doesn't melt," Ms. Geraci said. Dixie Harmon, co-chair of the Greater Cincinnati Coalition of People With Disabilities, said the scheduling becomes an invasion of privacy for the individual because ACCESS knows your every move. Several local handicapped organizations have publicly supported the demonstrations of American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation although they shy away from their methods.
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THE PLAIN DEALER, THURSDAY, MAY 22; 1986 page 19-A PHOTO by AP: Four policemen in their fancy police hats are "rolling" a man (Rick James) up a 150 degree (ie. almost vertical) "ramp" into a van. Rick is sitting with his hands up by his chest. His hat is missing and his hair is flying out in all directions. His expression is a mix of amazement, disgust and resignation. Caption reads: Cincinnati policemen push Rick James of Salt Lake City, Utah, up a ramp into a van after he was arrested outside a downtown hotel as part of a demonstration by American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation. Title: Cincy arrests disabled in protest of bus access By BILL SLOAT STAFF writer CINCINNATI — Police arrested l7 disabled people yesterday after they blockaded the entrance to a downtown hotel or chained themselves to the doorway of an adjoining office building that houses Queen City Metro, this city’s public bus service. Eleven of them refused to post bond and were in Hamilton County Justice Center under cash bonds ranging from $1,500 to $3,000. Five were released late yesterday on personal bonds. One pleaded no contest to disorderly conduct and was found guilty. Sixteen were in wheelchairs from polio, paralyzing spinal accidents, multiple sclerosis, cerebral palsy and amputations. One was blind and walked carrying a white cane. The arrests were made during a non-violent, noon demonstration that challenged lack of access to city buses here and around the nation. Chants of “We will ride" and “Access now” came from about 52 demonstrators outside the Westin Hotel. Some removed footstands from their wheelchairs and banged on metal barricades. Police stood behind the barricades and refused to let the demonstrators into the hotel. All 17 taken to jail said they were members of a national handicapped rights organization called American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation. “This is a civil disobedience action," said Wade Blank, 47, a Presbyterian minister who helped organize yesterday's protest. Blank, who now lives in Denver, was involved in anti-war demonstrations at Kent State University in the 1960s when he lived in Akron. Several of the people loaded onto vans and hauled away to the Hamilton County Justice Center on disorderly conduct charges compared Cincinnati to Selma and Montgomery, two Alabama cities where civil rights activists were jailed by authorities in the 1960s. “The message needs to be sent out that we can’t ride a bus because we're handicapped,” said Glenn Horton, 46, of El Paso, Texas. "It's discrimination it’s segregation and it’s appalling that it could still be happening in this country." Horton said he had been confined to a wheelchair since age 9, when he fell and broke his back. Bill Bolte, 54, of Los Angeles, said handicapped people needed mainline bus service to get to jobs, movies, dates, shopping, banks and anywhere else they might want to go. “We're already in prison," said Bolte, who had polio 51 years ago. “We're going to see that what few rights we have are not going to be taken away. Our rights to public transportation are being deprived, and we will not sit for it." Organizers of the protest said they took to the streets because about 600 executives of public and private transit companies in the eastern United States and Canada were attending a convention in the hotel that ends today. Protesters said the convention should adopt a resolution supporting the installation of wheelchair lifts on all public buses in the nation. Many came from Denver, which has such lifts in use on its bus fleet. The demonstration also came a day after the U.S. Department of Transportation announced in Washington, D.C., a new regulation that allows transit authorities to establish alternative services for the disabled instead of putting lifts on regularly scheduled buses. Demonstrators complained the rule meant that buses, subways and rail lines wouldn't be made accessible to people in wheelchairs. Police Chief Lawrence Whalen said the comparisons with Alabama in the 1960s were unfair when it came to the police. Police in the South during the civil rights era often brutalized protesters. Whalen yesterday said, “Our officers handled themselves very admirably. The group has had their chance to protest and get their point across." He said the police assigned to make arrests had attended special briefings on how to handle disabled people and were instructed to ask the people in custody the best way to lift them into vans. “We wanted to be sensitive to their special needs." Whalen said. Three of those arrested yesterday were out on $3,000 bond after incidents Monday when two climbed aboard city buses, paid fares and refused to leave when ordered off by Queen City Metro officials. The third interfered with a bus. The three, Robert A. Kafka, 40, of Austin, Texas; George Cooper, 58, of Irving, Texas; and Michael W. Auberger, 32, of Denver, were charged yesterday with Criminal trespassing when they chained themselves to the entranceway of Queen City Metro's offices. Police Capt. Dale Menkhaus told his men to use bolt cutters to get them out of the building. Kafka, Cooper and Auberger had been ordered Tuesday not to set foot in Cincinnati by a Municipal judge at the time they posted bond, but another Municipal judge lifted the banning order shortly before yesterday's protests started. Police Chief Lawrence Whalen said 14 others were charged with disorderly conduct for their activities outside the hotel. Bond was set at $3,000 each, a Hamilton County Municipal Court official said. Before the demonstration began, the group gathered in a Newport, Ky., motel for a strategy session on civil disobedience. They agreed not to carry anything but identification with them when they confronted police in downtown Cincinnati and they voted not to post bail. None of the people arrested were from Ohio. The 11 who refused to post bond and were in jail last night are: Bolte; Bob Conrad of Denver; Joe Carle of Denver; Auberger; Horton; Jim Parker of El Paso, Texas; Cooper; George Roberts of Denver; Earnest Taylor of Hartford, Conn.; Lonnie Smith of Denver; Kafka. Kelly Bates of Denver pleaded no contest to disorderly conduct, was found guilty and sentenced to 30 days in jail, which she is to start serving tomorrow. Those released on personal bond are Ken Heard of Denver; George Florman of Colorado Springs, Colo.; Frank Lozano of El Paso, Texas; Rick James of Salt Lake City, Utah; and Arthur Campbell of Louisville, Ky.
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Title: Arresting Theater By JIM FINKELSTEIN, Free Press Staff Writer An estimated 25 handicapped protesters were arrested Tuesday as they charged police guarding the McNamara Federal Building Tuesday in a third day of what one protester called "theater" over public transit's limited use of lift-equipped vehicles. Wave after wave of the estimated 100 protesters — many in wheelchairs and paralyzed, missing limbs, or suffering nerve disorders — were hauled away in lift-equipped vans while police photographers recorded the scene to ensure the protesters were properly arrested. Michael Auberger, a spokesman for the 100-member American Disabled for Accessible Public Transportation, vowed Tuesday that "we're going to escalate" the protest today and Thursday as the convention of the American Public Transit Association concludes at the Westin Hotel. “Everyone's willing to go" to jail. he added, hinting that the protest may move to the Westin today. Seventeen ADAPT members were arrested Monday as they tried to crawl aboard city buses to protest the lack of wheelchair equipment on 80 of 100 buses recently purchased by the city. THE DEMONSTRATORS want lift equipment on all new buses and trains purchased by U.S. public transit systems. The transit association won a court case to prevent more extensive federal regulations requiring lift equipment. Tuesday, the protesters began chanting slogans in front of the McNamara Federal Building just before 1 p.m. ADAPT spokespersons said the group wanted to present a position paper to Sen. Donald Riegle, D-Mich., whose offices are in the building. They refused a police offer to let two representatives meet with Riegle's aides, saying they wanted to send no fewer than nine. Police blocked the entrance and then began arresting protesters who blocked the entrance — both wheelchair users and non-handicapped ADAPT aides. Deputy Police Chief James Ingram said "a couple of hundred" police officers were given special training in arresting people who use wheelchairs. PHOTOS: Photo #1 Free Press Photo by GEORGE WALDMAN: A group of about 10 protesters chant out on the sidewalk in front of a large building. In front Bernard Baker and Stephanie Thomas, next row Kristen? (sitting alone), Fred (standing) & unknown, Renata Conrad (in manual) Marcos Quesada in wheelchairs. And Cathy Thomas and others in the background. Caption reads: Wheelchair-bound protesters chant outside the McNamara Federal Building in downtown Detroit. Photo #2: Free Press Photo by MANNY CRISOSTOMO Two uniformed police officers stand behind a man in a wheelchair (George Cooper) holding his push handles. The police are looking off into the distance and George holds a poster in his teeth that says "...With Liberty and Justice for All?" Caption reads: Detroit police officers carry George Cooper, of Irving, Tex., away from the scene. Photo #3: Free Press Photo by MANNY CRISOSTOMO A woman in a wheelchair (Paulette Patterson) holding the Holy Bible to her chest and with a pained and tearful cry, is being loaded onto a a lift equipped vehicle. Caption reads: An unidentified protester clutches her Bible as she's arrested. Photo #4 Free Press Photo by MANNY CRISOSTOMO A uniformed officer stands jauntily leaning on a barricade, on the other side of which are two ADAPT protesters in wheelchairs (Rick James and an unidentified woman.) Rick has a very intense expression on his face. Caption reads: Rick James, of Utah, left, watches Lt. Greg George, a federal policeman, at a barricade at the McNamara Federal Building.